Crisis PR: How to handle journalists and the media in a crisis

When crisis hits your organisation and the press are calling you for comment, it is extremely important that the media and journalists understand and feel that you as the company’s spokesperson, really care!

• Express sympathy and grave concern for what has happened

• Reassure the media that the matter has been taken extremely seriously

• Be as open as possible, do not appear to be hedging

• Don’t blame or admit to blame or negligence but do say, “This is what went wrong and this is what remedial action we took to ensure that this type of incident never happens again.”• If it is true, stress that this is the first incident to happen in the history of the company

• Reinforce what remedial action has been taken including anything ‘above and beyond the call of duty’

• Point out that your company’s standards are well above the statutory minimum (safety / hygiene / training)

• Stick to the facts and don’t speculate

• Keep calm and don’t be defensive

• Be honest and courteous

• Don’t commit to compensation!

• Make a record of the contact

• If you don't know the answer, don't answer it. An "I'll get back to you on that" is always a better answer than a made up one. Simply say, "That's a good question. I'm going to check on it and get back to you in 20 minutes." Then do it. Do not leave the reporter without a call back. Even if you call back to let the reporter know that you're still looking for the information, that's better than leaving them hanging.

Why is photography important for PR?

The short answer is that the media likes stories which come with pictures.

Having an eye-catching image can make the difference between a story being used or spiked.

On some news websites, the format demands that the journalist uses a picture. If you provide an image, your story immediately stands a much better chance of getting coverage.

In general, a story with a picture gets more editorial space and therefore has more impact in newspapers and magazines.

How do you get the high-quality images which send out the right message about your organisation?

 Use a professional photographer with a track record of working with media. Look at examples of their work – can they get the pictures you need?

 Send out the right image. Study your target media for examples of the pictures they prefer.

 Tell the story. If your news is about your company funding playground equipment at a primary school, get some children and the play equipment in the picture. Avoid dull handshake shots or people in suits presenting a cheque.

 Give good brief. Make sure the photographer knows what you’re looking for by providing a detailed brief, including examples of the type of shot required. Anyone involved in organising the shoot should be briefed too – make sure they know exactly what is involved, any special arrangements needed and how long the photoshoot will take.

 Get a caption. Don’t send images to the media without a caption, it drives journalists mad. People need to be fully identified with names and job titles.

Why use Twitter?

Twitter is often referred to as ‘micro-blogging’ as it is used to share views and opinions quickly and concisely.

And there’s no doubt that it’s effective: it currently has 3.7 million UK users, an increasing number of which are businesses.

But why has it become so popular and why should you be using it?

Twitter accounts are useful because they:

• Are excellent for disseminating your news stories quickly – When you log in to Twitter, how many times have you seen a Tweet from someone saying that they’ve seen a celebrity a few minutes before at a station or an airport? The point here is that Twitter is instant. Type in a short message, share it, and everyone following you knows about it immediately. Think of it as like sending a text, but to lots of people.

• Have the potential to reach influential people and groups – Worldwide, it’s estimated that around 106 million people or organisations have Twitter accounts: that gives you a potentially huge audience. Try to follow as many people/organisations as you can, but if you’re a business, be strategic – focus on finding similar businesses, clients, subcontractors or decision-makers who you already work with or are targeting – don’t just follow everyone and anyone.

• Create a sense of community – A crucial thing to remember when using Twitter or any social media tool is that online, people congregate around areas of interest rather than demographics. It’s an excellent place to meet and engage with like-minded individuals or businesses.

• Can be used to comment on issues relevant to your industry – If there’s an issue or topic that’s current in your industry, Twitter is a great place to air your views and also find out what your contemporaries think too. Find something topical, Tweet it and ask your followers for their views – the more regularly you do this, the more likely you are to get a response.

• Are a great way of sharing best practice – If you’ve found a method for doing something successfully that can help others, Twitter is an easy way of sharing it. For example, if you’ve put together a presentation about a particular subject, you can send a link to it out on Twitter so that everyone can see it.

FACT: You are 500 times more likely to read an advertorial than an advert…

Advertorials are back in fashion and for good reasons too. Surveys suggest that people are 500 times more likely to read an advertorial than an advert. That’s because they’re informative and they look and read like a real news or feature story.

Advertorials are paid-for ‘adverts’ which resemble an objectively-written editorial. Magazines, e-zines and newspapers love them because they generate income. Savvy businesses love them because they sell products and services. What’s more, they can be used for a myriad of marketing purposes from magazine features, to web-based ‘information sites’.

81 per cent more orders than adverts

Research by Reader’s Digest revealed that an advertorial which looked like a magazine article generated 81 per cent more orders than the same copy presented in a traditional advert format.

With an advertorial you also have full editorial control over your business messaging. That’s important if you need to clearly communicate the benefits of a new product or service, or, explain a complex or technical concept. Advertorials give you the ability to base the content directly around your key messages without the threat of the messages being diluted or used out of context.

Advertorials educate and build trust among customers and stakeholders

This is why more and more smart businesses are choosing to invest in well-written and targeted advertorials to get their messages out into the public realm.

A typical advertorial will be 600 to 1,200 words with space for photos and contact details – but avoid using logos!

Don’t expect one advertorial to suddenly result in a flood of calls and emails. If you want to convince people to buy into your business then you need to educate them by communicating your messages regularly. This will build the relationship between you and your customers. And, with many national and local newspapers now offering a range of off and online deals and packages, it really is a good time to start giving the advertorial a bit more of your attention.

Five tips on how to improve your search engine rankings

While most of us find websites through search engines like Google, MSN and Yahoo, but very few of us will look beyond the first two pages of search results. That’s why you want to make sure that your site is up at the top.

Five search engine optimisation (SEO) tips for improving your rankings on the internet:

1. Think carefully when selecting your keywords. Before you make your website live, you’ll need to create a list of keywords and phrases about your product or service. For example, if you sell shoes, this would need to be one of your keywords. However, lots of websites will have this as a keyword too, so choose a phrase with two or three key words which are relevant to you.

2. Include plenty of text content. Search engines find it difficult to pick up Flash content, but they love text. Try to use 100 or more words per page on your site, themed around your keywords or phrases.

3. Use your keywords frequently – between three and eight times per 100 words is usually recommended. And don’t forget to include keywords in your headlines or subheadings!

4. Add links to your site. Links help search engines to navigate the pages of your website, so make sure you have plenty littered throughout your site. A good place to start is by creating a home page which includes links through to other pages within your site.

5. Ask other sites to link to you. Try to get your links to your website on sites that are highly ranked by search engines. This is vital – search engines regard links to your site from other pages as a vote. The higher their search engine ranking, the more valid the vote is. Google has an application called PageRank which you can download to help you with this.

Social media is great for business if you have a strategy

Social media is becoming hugely important in business marketing yet few companies understand it, let alone know how to use it effectively. Creating a company page on Facebook, LinkedIn or a channel on YouTube will not help you win friends and influence people if you don’t know which social media platforms your customers use and what they use them for.

Social media is a communications platform which allows you to be highly targeted in your selling messages and reach exactly the right people you want to make friends with - that's if you know how to use it. And in the current climate, it should be an integral part of your marcoms strategy not an ‘after-thought’.

So, if you want your ‘Tweeting’, ‘Facebooking’ and social media activities to work for you, here are a few things to think about:

1. What are your aims and objectives? Who do you want to engage and communicate with and what do you want to say?

2. What social platforms do your customers / prospects use and what online communities do they participate in (e.g. Twitter, LinkedIn and Ecademy business forums are going to be more useful if you are a B2B organisation than Facebook)?

3. Tailor your key messages to the people and businesses you want to reach and tell them something useful and valuable to them.

4. Be social and don’t try to ‘preach’ or ‘hard sell’. This is about building long-term ‘friendships’ with people you want to do business with.

5. Most importantly, communicate consistently, truthfully and regularly with customers and prospects – it’s key to building trust, confidence and a profitable following.

Proposed parking charges in Wiltshire are barking mad

My local authority - Wiltshire Council - is holding a consultation about car parking charges across the county which has got me extremely hot under the collar!

My E=MC2 chums are also pretty angry too because they’ll have to start paying £4.50 a day, £22.50 a week; £90 a month and almost £1,100 a year! Money they could have spent on 4,050 cans of my favourite tripe flavour Pedigree Chum and a couple of juicy lamb bones from Lee Downer the butcher up the street.

Now everyone will leave their cars on the street, block buses, Massey Fergusons and combine harvesters and create huge traffic jams! And who's going to pay £4.50 a day when they can park for nothing on public roads or pay £3 at the Tisbury railway station?

If these ludicrous parking charges are enforced in Tisbury people won’t shop in the village anymore, our high street will die and local employers will be forced to move elsewhere. If the council wants to bring Wiltshire villages to their knees, this is the way to do it.

If you ask me, they’re all a bunch of city slickers who think that chickens come frozen.

If you don’t like the new parking charges and want to comment, go to: http://consult.wiltshire.gov.uk/portal/ltp/ltp_parking_strategy